


When the Wind is Southerly

by cakeisnotpie



Category: Avengers: Earth's Mightiest Heroes, Marvel, Marvel (Comics), Marvel (Movies), The Avengers (Marvel) - All Media Types
Genre: Alternate Universe - Werewolf, M/M, Were-Creatures, Werewolves, playing with style, sarcastic narrator
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2014-07-05
Updated: 2014-07-05
Packaged: 2018-02-07 12:31:15
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: Creator Chose Not To Use Archive Warnings
Chapters: 1
Words: 3,019
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/1899123
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/cakeisnotpie/pseuds/cakeisnotpie
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>Thing about being a Were? Everybody got it wrong. All the myths and legends were laughable considering how far off they were from the reality. Take the full moon thing. Yeah, no. Weres changed whenever they wanted to, day or night, waxing or waning. Best anyone could explain, the moon cycles stories went hand-in-hand with the female menstrual cycle, sort of a misogynistic “once-a-month-craziness-happens” defense that became men’s excuse to go on rampages and get away with it.</p>
            </blockquote>





	When the Wind is Southerly

**Author's Note:**

> For those of you who follow me on tumblr, you know I've been struggling with writer's block. To try and get around it, I'm writing whatever comes to mind. So here's this. I have no clue where it came from or what to do with it. I'm posting as is with only a rough edit because I need to feel like I've accomplished something. My muse needs the kick in the pants. Let me know what you think.

Thing about being a Were? Everybody got it wrong. All the myths and legends were laughable considering how far off they were from the reality. Take the full moon thing. Yeah, no. Weres changed whenever they wanted to, day or night, waxing or waning. Best anyone could explain, the moon cycles stories went hand-in-hand with the female menstrual cycle, sort of a misogynistic “once-a-month-craziness-happens” defense that became men’s excuse to go on rampages and get away with it.

The change? It wasn’t bone-breaking (thanks Landis for that image that squicked everyone out) but it also wasn’t meltingly easy like that bartender on _True Blood_. Took a damn lot of energy, like running a couple miles flat out; most could only manage it once every few days unless they practiced and got into really good physical condition. The whole six-pack ab thing? Blame that on Joe Manganiella or the Lautner kid. Weres weren’t all perfect 10s; they came in all shapes and sizes. Sitting around watching _Dog Cops_ and eating a dozen donuts at a sitting was just as bad an idea for a Were as it was for a mundane. Genetics and metabolism still mattered.  

They weren’t mindless beasts either – for the most part.  If they were a sadistic son-of-a-bitch as a man, they were a rabid wolf. Mild-mannered, sweet tempered woman? A loving Golden Retriever. Single 50-year-old overweight non-threatening guy? A big fuzzy tabby cat. Oh, and not everyone was a wolf, obviously. Many varieties of Weres existed although they were very few reptiles for some reason. (One guy shifted into an iguana, but that’s a story for another day).

The majority of Weres were carriers of a specific genetic code. Hereditaries, born and raised that way. Not always with shifter parents, but usually with someone in their close family to train them up right. Hereditaries were the smartest and most in control of all of them. A Were community existed, the largest groupings in more rural areas where there was land to run, but most major cities had a thriving market of Were doctors, priests, EMTS, and cops. Just in case.

Then there were the Changling Weres, the ones who came later in life, through blood transfusions or accidental infections. Maybe a quarter of all Weres were like this; if they made it through the illness that consumed their bodies after the initial exposure, they usually survived. The community kept a look out for changlings, encouraging counseling from the very beginning. A new Were going through the shift for the first time could be a danger. That’s how a nurse found Clint Barton after the tainted transfusion that saved his life; she saw the temperature spike, the heart rate fluctuations, and pupil dilation, checked the donor and realized he’d been infected.

When Clint woke up in the hospital – last thing he remembered was Duquesne’s sword in his gut and Barney sneering down at him – he found a sweet lady in Spongebob Squarepants scrubs offering him ice chips and telling him his life had changed. She explained, in very succinct terms,  what he was now, that he’d have to wait until he was stronger to change, and that one of the doctors on staff specialized in Were conversions.

Turns out, Clint didn’t really need any help adjusting. His life, as he saw it, had ended when his brother betrayed him. This was an opportunity to reinvent himself, become something else entirely. Once he did change, all he could do was laugh at the turn of events. With a bit of money the community gave him and the name of a Were recruiter for the Army, Clint signed on, determined to make the most of his new skill set. If he’d been better able to stomach the rules and bullshit orders, he’d have made a career as a sniper, but the call of his bow and a little white sliver of paper with the name of one Philip J. Coulson were too much of a temptation. He became SHIELD and the rest, well, there were a lot of tabloids out there trying to fill in the blanks.

Weres in general were secretive types; centuries of being hunted down as monsters couldn’t be unwritten by a few decades of being romantic heroes. Of the team, Clint was sure that Natasha knew even though he’d never told her. The Red Room had experimented on shifters and she had a nose for ferretting out the truth. Her reaction was simply to huff and not mention it. For the rest, well, Clint hadn’t exactly been circumspect … falling off a building with no one around was a sure way to die if he didn’t change … but he didn’t advertise either. Tony was oblivious; Clint had actually caught him watching _Finding Bigfoot_ one time and had a conversation about mythical creatures at 3 a.m. Steve never said anything despite the word in the Were community that at least one of the Howling Commandos really could howl. Like, really. Clint couldn’t read Bruce, but the Hulk started calling him Birdy not long after a fight where Clint was forced to shift by one of Von Doom’s new death/freeze/mutation rays. It had been aimed at Bruce, but Clint got the edge of it up on his perch. Fortunately, no one was watching him; everyone else too busy trying to contain the raging green guy on the ground. If Thor was aware, he was being awfully quiet; Clint had asked around while visiting Asgard and there was an active Were community there, very open about their abilities.  He figured Thor just thought it was all pretty normal; he half-expected Thor to suggest he shift one day in the middle of a battle, like “Clint, could your other form not make that climb easier?”

The one person he most wanted to know was the one who could never find out. From the day Phil Coulson had recruited him, Clint had looked up to the man first as a role model, then as his handler, and finally as his friend. At least a dozen times, Clint had wanted to tell Phil. Once, in Singapore, he’d started the sentence only to be interrupted by drug runners. As Clint’s feeling for Phil grew over the years, so too did his desire to share what was unarguably the second best part of his life.

The problem was, Phil was a fan. On their third mission, Phil had found _American Werewolf in London_ on the TV in the safe house and insisted everyone watch it.  The man had a vintage Lon Chaney’s _The Wolfman_ poster in his living room. He had the whole run of _The Howling Commandos_ comics with Warwolf as the commander, Gorilla Man, Zombie, Clone of Frankenstein, the Living Mummy, Vampire by Night, Glob and Grogg (yeah, don’t ask) all wrapped in plastic protector sleeves. Jack Russell’s _Werewolf-by-Night_ was one of his personal favorites. He’d seen every werewolf movie, even all the _Twilight_ s – for research purposes, he said – and loved both the BBC and the SYFY channel’s version of _Being Human_. Everyone knew that Phil had had a bit of a crush on Oz from _Buffy the Vampire Slayer_ back in the 90s (okay, for a teenager, the kid was cute, Clint would give him that) and that Derek Hale was NOT a crush for Phil but full on man lust even if it was cradle robbing. Shelves in Phil’s living room were lined with every episode of _Dark Shadows_ ; they were right next to his first edition of _The Wolf Leader_ by Alexandre Dumas and Robert Louis Stevenson’s _Strange Case of Dr. Jekyll and Mr. Hyde_.  Clint had to admit the Harry Dresden series of books actually hit close to home. The college kids, Billy and Georgia, were pretty good representations of Were life. Not like the Anita Blake books that were hardly more than Were and Vamp porn at this point.

Most people were surprised to find that the Captain America fanboy adored gothic tales of werewolves and modern paranormal fantasy.  Phil had explained it one time over a couple bottles of beer; Steve Rogers was all that was good about humanity, a solid moral compass in the darkest times. Weres were the opposite, the animal inside, clawing its way out. Phil was invested in the stories and Clint had no desire to upend Phil’s childhood fantasies just to be selfish. They were friends, yes, but that was all. Probably wasn’t Clint’s brightest idea to keep what he was secret, but, hey, just because he had perfect aim didn’t mean that he knew jack shit about relationships with people.  Those stories about packs and mating and all the other romantic nonsense? Well, first off, Clint wasn’t a wolf, but the whole alpha/omega/beta stuff was nothing more than a laugh. No, Clint figured the odds of him having any sort of successful relationship were slim to none – see exhibit A (Bobbi) and B (Jess) – so why mess with one of the two that were working? 

Of course, status quo didn’t last. About the same time that Clint discovered the rumor of another kind of Were was true, things went to hell in a vibranium cart faster than he could say “Wakanda? Where the hell is Wakanda?” He and Phil chased a HYDRA operative who led them right to Baron Von Strucker in the middle of Africa and a very convoluted scheme to steal the rare metal and build something that looked for the world like a giant steel badger. Someone was watching too much Monty Python. Barely on the ground for more than three minutes, native warriors surrounded them and insisted they leave. Nothing Phil said about SHIELD or HYDRA got through to the very tall, very muscular, very imposing circle of fighters with long pointy spears. Clint had just about decided to fight his way out of the situation – his de facto solution to most problems – when a werepanther dropped in, literally, from the trees.

T’Challa, Prince of Wakanda, was a mental Were. Yep, seemed there were some people who didn’t physically change; they were able to channel the attributes and abilities of their animal while remaining human. The man moved like a big cat, had hearing so sharp he could tell exactly where Strucker’s men were, over a mile away, slashing through undergrowth, and the agility to travel through the dense branches without ever touching the ground. Oh, and he knew what Clint was just by smell alone. Because of that, he allowed Clint and Phil to accompany him and his people as they hunted down the intruders.  Well, that and T’Challa also had a bit of a thing for Steve; turns out the two had met before and Steve being Steve had made a good impression on the Prince.

That’s how they ended up on the damn ledge, a cornered HYDRA bigwig and  his dastardly monologue with a fancy ray gun of some sort aimed right at Clint’s heart. A ray gun that went off when T’Challa leaped down from above; a blue blast that hit Phil square in the chest rather than Clint because the idiot jumped in front of him like he was a secret service agent saving the President.  A jump that carried Phil right over the edge; Clint watched him plummet downward towards the jungle, twisting as he tried to control his fall.

Thing was, there really wasn’t a choice. Clint could save Phil – he’d never forgive himself if he didn’t do it, consequences be damned. Before he even made the decision, he launched himself into the air, bow and quiver dropping on the ledge with his boots and clothes. Everyone thought the rip away seams were for those times when he found himself trapped in fallen debris (which happened more often that it really ought to) but clothes didn’t magical changed when a Were did, so easy off and quick on was the best options.  Nothing worse than tidy whities caught up in feathers and wings. Awkward.

It was called the law of conservation of matter, and it applied to Weres. (Don’t ask about the Hulk. He was an exception to every rule). As he spread his wings, brown and reddish feathers appeared as wings sprouted, and he became a Ferruginous Hawk. A really big one, with heavy talons that closed around Phil’s arms, powerful muscles that stopped their descent and pulled up before Phil did more than drag his feet against some leaves. Might seem like random luck, but Clint practiced catching people because, first off, he had a crazy assed job where weird stuff happened all the time and, second, he was enamored with the eagles in _the Lord of the Rings_.  Bad assed big birds – Clint could identify with them. So he had some Weres who let him use them for target practice. He didn’t relish slicing up the arms of the person he was trying to save.

He might have been able to get away with the “Wakanda has really big birds” excuse – could work – except for the hole in Phil’s chest and the far-too-much blood he was losing. The hospital in the capitol city was state-of-the-art, but Clint knew before they even got Phil stabilized that he’d need a transfusion. Fate was a real bitch; they both shared the same blood type and, while there were plenty of Wakandans who had the same, there were laws against sharing their blood with outsiders. Archaic, yes, with a touch of isolationism, but there it was. Phil needed blood and Clint could give it to him.

All Weres knew that turning another person without consent was beyond the pale. You just didn’t do it. No one used the word rape, but that’s essentially the way Clint felt about it. Yeah, had he been asked he’d have said yes, and it wasn’t like his life had turned out all the bad, but that wasn’t the point. He wasn’t normal and couldn’t be used as a comparison. So he girded himself and went into Phil’s room, slumping by the bed and waiting for Phil to surface.

Phil’s eyes were unfocused, but he knew who Clint was and what had happened. He cut Clint off and asked about Strucker and T’Challa before Clint could get to the important part. Brazening it out, Clint just talked over Phil.

“You need a blood transfusion. The Wakanadans have some law against their blood going to outsiders. That leaves me. I’m a match,” Clint breathed out in a rush.

“I know,” Phil said.

“Right, so, thing is … well, if we do this … things won’t be the same,” Clint stumbled through his rehearsed speech, mucking it up royally.

“I know,” Phil said, reaching his hand over and clasping Clint’s.

“You’ll be different and might not … I like being friends and … I don’t know if …” Clint just couldn’t get the right words out.

“I know,” Phil said. He tugged Clint’s hand up and brushed a kiss over his battered knuckles.

“Wait … you think … I mean, you want to … with me?” A hope flared in Clint’s chest but he quickly squashed it. “You don’t understand. My blood … it will make you like me … change you …”

“I know, Clint,” Phil said. “You molt.”

Stunned, Clint sat down hard, chair squeaking beneath him. “You know. And you still want to…”

“Yes,” Phil said. “I agree to the transfusion and I want us to be more than friends.”

Clint was speechless.

“Assuming you want to,” Phil said, watching for Clint’s reaction.

Clint stuttered and managed, “Y-y-y-yes.”

“Good.” Phil exhaled. “I can’t wait to find out what it’s like.” His voice began to fade as he slipped back into much needed rest.

“I know,” Clint answered but Phil was already asleep.

Changeling Weres didn’t always take the same form as their sires. Hereditaries shared DNA from their parents and were much more likely to follow in their footsteps or paw prints. But the virus mutated the new host’s existing sequence, so the outcome was more random. Occasionally there were misfires – one poor girl who was allergic to cats was a lynx. She had to take industrial sized shots – but usually things worked out for the best. Clint’s eyesight was enhanced by his hawk abilities and his talent to never miss all the stronger for it. And if he had a habit of wanting to fly away to a perch somewhere to hide, well, Clint had always been like that.

No one was more surprised than Phil when he changed for the first time into a beautiful timber wolf. Clint half-way expected Fate to have a sense of humor, but as Natasha told Phil, Native Americans called the grey wolf a pathfinder and teacher, loyal pack member and defender of the territory, so, in truth, it made sense. Phil didn’t take down any of his posters; if anything, Phil took his collecting to a new level, developing an eye for ancient pottery and other culture’s depictions of wolves in folk lore. Somehow, in the middle of coming out to the other Avengers  -- Tony freaked out then wanted to be a Were himself (Iron Wolf, he declared), Bruce shrugged, and Steve verified the story about the Commandos (much to Phil’s absolute orgasmic pleasure) – and telling Fury – who immediately wanted Phil to draft a policy for all the Weres already in SHIELD – they managed to find time for dinner then a movie then a couple nights of take-out and then moved on to late night couch cuddling, clothing optional entertainments, and pancake breakfasts. Dating took as much energy as shifting but they slid into a relationship as if they were always meant to be in each other’s space. Of course, they always had been.

Clint worried that it was too easy, that he would mess it all up. It was Thor who settled him once and for all, reminding him that some characteristics of the animal did affect the human.  For all Hollywood got wrong, turned out that Rutger Hauer movie got it right.

Wolves and Hawks do mate for life. 


End file.
